Francis Maude has written a MY WEEK diary in the Sunday Times, telling of his week teaching English in Rwanda. He's out there with Andrew Mitchell and his group of 100 Tory activists, candidates and MPs. It brought back a lot of memories for me of my trip there last year. Andrew asked me to go with them again this time, and, believe me, I was tempted. It was one of the most memorable weeks of my life.
If Andrew's political career ended tomorrow he could look back with pride at what he and his entourage have achieved in their time in Rwanda. They have left a lasting legacy in a country which has pulled itself up by its bootstraps after its terrible experiences of the mid 1990s.
Makes you proud to be a Conservative.
UPDATE: Tobias Ellwood tells of his experience in Rwanda on ConHome.
19 comments:
Well done Andrew for this brilliant initiative.
And well done my MP to be, Rob Halfon of Harlow who's been teaching English in Rwanda during his hols!
Makes you proud to be a decent human being as well, I'd have thought.
You lot are so patronising it's quite something. A wolf in a sheep's clothing.
Sounds exactly like the type of patronising gap year jolly rich 18 year olds with too much middle class self loathing tend to do. Carbon footprint, anyone?
Why does Mrs Jellyby come to mind?
NuLabour = BluLabour = NuLabour ...
We could do with some teaching by these MPs in our schools in Islington, particularly in the school which was nearest to Blair's house and which he did not choose for his children. First Hodge and her loony left, then New Labour and trendy left (the same bunch) and now woolly LibDems and their non-policies, all have contributed so much that our primary and secondary schools in Islington are right at the bottom of the league table.
So a few people with no real teaching experience spending a single week in Rwandan schools constitutes a "lasting legacy" does it? It's not even a drop in the ocean of Rwanda's needs.
Some of the things Maude refers to sound more useful, such as "training local doctors and nurses". But for foreign politicians to spend a week pretending to be teachers is a complete waste of time. It is also a blatant misallocation of resources, as those politicians could do far more for Rwanda if they spent that week using their wealth and organising skills to arrange for the training of local teachers, or to set up sponsorship mechanisms to provide long-term support to those schools.
Playing teacher is just self-indulgent, and it's very obviously using the Rwandan children as a photo opportunity to promote the Cameroonian image of caring, sharing Conservatism. Will Dave be encouraging us to Hug a Hutu?
Iain will probably accuse me of being cynical. But for all the real charitable work that these trips might do they are also exploiting the situation in Rwanda for the political benefit of the Conservative party, and that aspect of them deserves a cynical response.
Andrew, with respect, you are talking utter rubbish. The whole Rwandan programme has been set up to leave a legacy, not just to go there for two weeks and do good works and then bugger off.
Perhaps you think it would have been better not to bother at all. Perhaps you think we should just leave them to get on with it. Or just give them money.
I do not agree. I have seen at first hand what was done last year. So did seven lobby journalists who went out as cynics and returned convinced of the worth of what Andrew Mitchell and his team had done.
we are constantly being told that the 2012 olympics will also leave a legacy !
having worked for rather more than a couple of weeks in west africa all i can say once more is 'poor bloody africa' !
When I look back at the lowest point in Cameron`s adventures , (which I have done ), it was probably the PR disaster that was the Rwanda photo op .The other contributing factor was the ineffectual influence of Francis Maude.
I wonder if the happy smiling faces of the grateful PICANNINIES worked its magical charm on this lot.
and probably prouder if they had gone and given the help and kept quiet about it.. otherwise they just re inforce the feeling that this was done with silly season coverage in mind.
Iain, I accept that there may be aspects of these visits that will have a lasting value, such as the work "training local doctors and nurses" that I mentioned in my previous post. But are you seriously suggesting that Maude's week at a school will achieve anything meaningful for Rwanda?
The only benefit will be the benefit he and his party gain from the publicity. The bulk of Maude's article is spent on his pointless school visit and on describing the past sufferings of the people of Rwanda. The people who are actually doing things that might leave a legacy, such as "working with judges and lawyers to develop their skills" or "advising the government and companies on what is needed to attract investment", are only mentioned in passing in one small paragraph. So it's a whole article of Maude bigging himself up with only a token mention of the people who are doing the real work. As such, it is a party political piece intended to benefit Maude and the Conservative Party, with the poor people of Rwanda as a convenient backdrop.
I am not denying that some good work is being done. I am pointing out that the good work co-exists with some utterly cynical and self-serving work, and the latter is extremely distasteful. If you disagree perhaps you could explain:
(a) How Maude's brief visit to a school is going to create a "lasting legacy" for anybody
(b) Why his article relegates the people who are doing real long-term work to one brief paragraph
(c) Whether you disagree with my argument that he could have done far greater good by spending the week he spent as a teacher on using the resources at his disposal to create long-term support for the schools, or for the training of local teachers
(d) If you don't disagree, why do you think he was doing it other than for the publicity it would generate for him and his party?
(e) Why is the Conservative Party doing this at all, if it's not for the political benefit?
For God's sake. Read Tobias Ellwood's piece on Conservative Home.
These people had a choice. Spend two weeks on a beach, or spend more than £1,000 of their own money learning about a different country, a different culture and helping the, rebuild their country.
If you don't see the positives in that and continue to hold such cynical views then I feel sorry for you.
I went last year. I saw it at first hand. So did a number of journalists. You don;t get much more cynical than them.
Email Francis Elliott, Jane Merrick, Darren Bentley or Will Woodward if you don't believe me.
Why do people take the pi** when others are just trying to be nice and decent?
This is really touching. I read about the earlier trip and was genuinely impressed. They don't have to do this. God bless Andrew Mitchell and co. And yes, I'm normally cynical, but there's really no PR mileage in this. These are just people practising genuine Christianity. So let's quit carping and find out how we can chip in to help future initiatives like this.
"Makes you proud to be Tory?"
In 1994 when you were busy extolling the virtues of Major, the then Tory government completely ignored the Rwandan conflict and genocide with the usual excuse of "That's Francophone Africa, nothing to do with us". All despite the pleading of the UN commander on the ground for help.
The Labour government has broken the taboo of getting involved in Francophone Africa, being the biggest bilateral donor to the Democratic Republic of Congo (which is a source of much of the conflict in the part of Africa that contains Rwanda).
Your token trip to Rwanda was nothing more than a cheap PR exercise in an attempt to wash off the blood on your parties hands.
AfricanMum said...
"Why do people take the pi** when others are just trying to be nice and decent?"
Are you not the same African who was telling us, just a few weeks ago, that Africa would be better off without the aid industry? Or did that not apply to right-wing 'aiders'?
To Anonymous, at 9.01 am, I was referring to financial handouts. Doling out money to corrupt govts never helps the type of people this trip has obviously helped. The corrupt elite merely use aid money to buy the latest Benz models and build lots of mansions. By all means you can travel to Africa and volunteer, impart practical skills, and best still trade with cooperatives and businesses there. In fact the most useful financial aid that goes to Africa is from people like myself and friends, who live here and quietly help out financially, but we don't wear wristbands and crow about it while watching silly programmes on the Beeb about helping people portrayed as unable to help themselves. Andrew Mitchell's trip was nothing like that. Just people helping out other humans in a practical way.
But giving money, and then meddling by installing favoured corrupt leaders would never help Africa. I guess from your last phrase you're one of the leftie new colonialists plagueing Africa with your well-meaning but destructive initiatives. Remember the saying about teaching a man to fish being better than doling out fish to him?
Forgot to add, lefties are perhaps upset at this trip since they can't play the race card next election. They can't patently mount the same ludicrous attack they did against Boris in London by claiming Tories aren't interested in all members of multicultural Britain.
Again, well done to Andrew Mitchell.
AfricanMum said...
"I guess from your last phrase you're one of the leftie new colonialists plagueing Africa with your well-meaning but destructive initiatives."
You guess wrong.
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